hope to you…

Hope…
A familiar word to most.
Our family has spent many a days hoping.

Hope is universal whether we know it or not.
The object of our hope may differ, (good or bad) but everyone hopes for something…
Everyone.

Since our purchase of a P.O. Box my heart has been alive with expectation.
I know that I have a letter on the way from my precious grandmother and mom.
I have spent weeks checking.
Each day the postal worker, (who I am determined to make a best pal)
Says, “Maybe tomorrow?”Each new day… we try again…
Each new day… we turn the key in hope…
Only to find this…
As we leave, what we always say the same thing…
“Vivimos en esperanza.”
We live in HOPE!

Some spend all their resources on what they hope will happen…Others spend all their talents…For many it’s all about the thrills and the highs…For me…
I feel that I am constantly contending for hope.
A hope so big it’s totally impossible if God doesn’t miraculously intervene.
It’s painful for my heart to hope this large.
All of my surroundings declare that I am just one small girl…A girl that has trouble and fears of her own.

Still yet, I risk…
I hope.
I have no other choice.

Somedays it takes all the strength I have…
I mean this with all my heart.

Honestly, many days my hope looks a lot like our trips to the Post Office…
Somedays… I go with great expectation…
Somedays… I go with deep awareness that I will most likely leave disappointed.
Somedays I go just for the routine… not because hope is alive, but because it’s just something we do…
It’s routine.

I love the part of scripture that talks about how God answered the prayer that Zechariah and Elizabeth no longer prayed.
A prayer they spent a lifetime praying.
A prayer about a promise.
A prayer about an impossibility.
A prayer they HOPED for.
A prayer to birth something.
A hope they had most likely given up on.

Then, after months, years, and decades.
He answered right on time… and their “and suddenly” happened.
One average, non-seemingly special day…
Hope arrived…I can tell you from personal experience…
Even on a small scale…
There is nothing more precious than seeing the penmanship of your creator.
Especially when you have been starving for it.

In my new world…
My appetite has changed and continues…
What once stirred my belly no longer does.
I hunger for love to bring a change that religion never can.
I desire a new level of freedom for this country.

I want single moms to have a future…
Battered women to be defended and mended…
Little boys and girls to know the love of a father…
For babies to live in love and not be sold…
For old women and men to dream…
For young girls to know the beauty they carry…Beauty to be shared and not taken by force.
I want us to shift this culture…
One that my children are now woven into.
I could go on and on.

Yes, I know this requires a lot of wait time.
I know I will not experience ALL the “and suddenly’s” I desire.
I know the battle is uphill, and I know me and my personal struggles.
Most importantly, I know He is my only hope.
I CANNOT do this without Him… any of it.

My Good Pastor and I are always asking our new tico friends…
“What are your hopes?”
Sadly, most have no idea how to respond.

I wonder today…
What are your hopes?
Are there promises you are waiting for?
Are there prayers you no longer pray but secretly yearn for?
Remember… you could be one prayer, one conversation, one interview, one hope, one Post Office trip away from unexpected breakthrough.

Praying for fresh hope today…
For Costa Rica…
For you…
For my family…
For me.
Blessings and HOPE to you,
Kelly